, 1887-08-20
lTAl IAN WOOD eATHeReRs.
Coal HiIi- Unknown to New Y"rk'- Italia
Tenement Dwellers.

~'NH $50 - ~ 10 49, y
Tenement Dwensrs.
Among the earliest risers in the city
are the gypsy faced orc from tho
Italian tenements of Mott and Mulberry
streets. The gray light has barely
streaked the eastern sky before, in groups
of three or four, by twos and singly, Of
all ages, from the withered and wrinkled
crone of four score to the little girl of
eight years, they can be seen hurrying
along the streets to begin their daily toll.
They seem to be always in high spirits,
and as they pass along they laugh and
chatter and show their glistening teeth,
and are as merry as bands of school girls
on the eve of a holiday. They are brave
~helpmeets, these women, and by constant
labor reduce the household expenses Of
Mulberry street to a minimum. Coal
bills with them are unknown. All the
voc they use for cooking purposes is
carried on their heads, often long dis
tances from places where old buildings
are being torn down. Areporter, stand
ing at the foot of Franklin's statue in
Printing House square at daybreak on a
recent morning, counted sixty-three ltal-
ian women in thirty minutes. They
came from the direction of the Italian
quarter and passed down Nassau street.
Each one carried a coarse cloth or towel.
Some were barefoot, some had shoes and
stockings, and still others wore the cow
skin without the stockings. Their black
hair, freshly plated and CREASED, was
tied in coils about their heads and tawdry
jewelry hung about their necks and from
their ears.
where are they all going SO early in
the morning. asked the reporter of a
big, broad backed policeman who stood
watching the women and swinging his
club.
The officer replied that a large six
storied building was being torn down and
they We're going down to carry off the
wooden wreckage.
Several hundred of them go down
here every morning about this time
said he. 'In about twenty minutes, if
you wait, you will see them coming back
with loads on their heads sufficient to
break the back of a brewery wagon
horse. -
The reporter waited. The swarthy
women still came in a stream from
Center street, crossed the square and hur-
ried down Nassau street out of sight.
Presently the first of the Industrious
ho~usekeepers was seen returning stagger-
liS AilbNl u lpuI L VII Z lltdh VI
heavy pieces of beams, broken laths and
fragments of dusty woodwork. Her
bundle was tied about with a tout cord.
Her towel, folded into a pad, protected
the skull from the rough surface of the
load. The woman's face was a study for
a painter in its expression of pure and
unalloyed happiness. Capt. Kidd, bear
ing away the spoils of rich Spanish gal
leon, couldn't nave beer more thoroughly
at peace with himself and all the world
than the heavily laden child of the APP
pennies as, with one arm akimbo on her
stout hips and the other used to steady
her burden, she steered straight for the
Bend of Mulberry street. AS she passed
out of view other women with similar
loads on their heads hove in sight in Mas
sau rect. Soon that narrow thorough
fare was a moving mass of great bundles
of wood drifting steadily toward the
Bend.
''They make excellent s%cavengers,"
said the policeman. THE contractors
are glad to get rid of the wood and give
them every chance to clean up n torn
down building. The price of coal never
affects them Mulberry street Eyetalians,
30 long as the women can bring in wood
by the o New York Tribune.